A St. Thomas’s thread. The tale is that St. Thomas planted Christianity in China, and then returned to Malʹabar. Here he saw a huge beam of timber floating on the seanear the coast, and the king endeavouring, by the force of men and elephants, to haul it ashore, but it would not stir. St. Thomas desired leave to build a church with it, and, his request being granted, he dragged it easily ashore with a piece of packthread. (Faria y Sousa.)

Chief of the Triple Thread. Chief Brahmin. Osoʹrius tells us that the Brahmins wore a symbolical Tessera of three threads, reaching from the right shoulder to the left. Faria says that the religion of the Brahmins proceeded from fishermen, who left the charge of the temples to their successors on the condition of their wearing some threads of their nets in remembrance of their vocation; but Osoʹrius maintains that the triple thread symbolises the Trinity.